Under The Plane Tree

Conversation held on Thursday May 10th 2018 at 12 EST “A person is as good as his faith. He is what his faith makes him.” (Chapter 17, line 5) Summary of Chapters 16 and 17 Krishna describes”two kinds in the creation of the world, divine and demonic.” The divine leads to “release”, the demonic to [...][Continue Reading...]

Conversation held on Thursday May 3rd 208 at 12 EST “Cut down this Asvattha so thoroughly rooted with the hardened axe of disinterest. ” (Chapter 15, lines 1-5) Summary of Chapters 14 and 15 Krishna elaborates the idea presented in the previous chapter, which says that everything rides on knowing the distinction between the “field” and [...][Continue Reading...]

Conversation held on Monday, April 23rd 2018, 8 pm Central (9 EST/6 Pacific) “Where in it, then, would justice and injustice be? Along with which of th things we considered did they come into being?“ “I can’t think, Socrates,” he said, “unless it’s somewhere in some need these men have of one another.” (II.372a) Summary [...][Continue Reading...]

Conversation held on Thursday April 26th, 2018 at 12 Noon EST. “When he perceives that the variety of beings have one center from which all expand, then he is at one with brahman.” (Chapter 13, line 30) Summary of Ch 12 and 13 Chapter 12 begins with a question from Arjuna: Who are the [...][Continue Reading...]

Conversation held on Thursday April 19th, 2018 at 12 Noon EST. “I am time grown old to destroy the world, embarked on a course of world annihilation” ” (Chapter 11, lines 30-35) Opening Question Arjuna has been given the ‘divine sight’ to finally see [...][Continue Reading...]

(The following submission is re-post by a long-time participant of Symposium seminars, Reynaldo Miranda. We hope you enjoy! It follows upon Part 1, “Keynes, the Laissez-Faire and Sedimentation”. Part 3 coming soon! ) All specific names come to be, grow, decay, and pass away–names and their articulations are naturally temporal. When terms and phrases are coined they [...][Continue Reading...]

Conversation held on Monday, April 16th 2018, 8 pm Central (9 EST/6 Pacific) “If we should watch a city coming into being in speech,” I said, “would we also see its justice coming into being and its injustice?” “Probably,” he said. Summary of Book II 368c-369b This brief but rich section sets out Socrates’ ‘opinion’, [...][Continue Reading...]

Conversation held on Thursday April 12th, 2018 at 12 Noon EST. “How may I know you, yogin, in my constant meditations? In what various modes of being may I meditate on you, my lord?” (Chapter 10, line 15-20) Chapters 9 and 10 Opening Question Krishna says at the opening of Chapter 9, the “royal [...][Continue Reading...]